A Closet in the Loft Upstairs

(This post was originally published back in 2009. Like all fine things, finishing this closet area off has taken time! Here’s Part 1, Part 2 will come tomorrow and then finally on Saturday I can give an awesome update about what work has Just Now been completed.)

When the weather turns cold, it’s a good time to just stay inside! We had a cold snap the week before last, so the Gman got a few things worked on.

First, he changed around an ugly hallway fixture that’s been here since before we moved in.

That’s better! And though you can’t really tell from this picture, it throws a Lot more light, so it is a lot safer.

When we moved in here, there weren’t many closets at all in this house. Bit by bit, we’re trying to fix that.

This is the upper loft – it’s above our dining room, and it’s situated right off our master bedroom. The perfect place for a couple of nice big closets.

Graham started on this project last year, but you know how it is. Too many things to do and if the weather is good, we tend to be outside. And all we really needed, in the beginning, was more closet rod space so we could hang our clothes.

The black pipe is the stovepipe from the woodstove. I had painted the walls of the loft last year, before the Graham started the construction. Once it’s all done, he will mill a nice pine beetle board and we will run that up from that ledge to the ceiling. Then, I can finish painting that bit of wall there.

So the other week, he got back to work on the closet. He finished trimming out the inside with pine panelling. He finished the wiring, so now we have one light in each closet, as well as one light outisde in the loft walkway.

The one closet has basically just the rod in it and there is enough room in there to hang all our hanging clothes. There’s also one closet in the master bedroom, so that’s enough for what we need.

Eventually, he will build closet doors. Until that time, he’s hung hooks and ran string along. I’ll just open the sides of two matching sheets, and string them up there to keep the clothes clean. I think it will look a lot better than the two old housecoats currently being used!

And we will put down laminate flooring to match what is on the main floor – oak. It’s very nice and is so easy to maintain.

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For the other closet, I am going to try to design it so we have space to put things like cowboy boots, my purses, scarves, etc.

(That piece of OSB? That fits into our bedroom window when we put the air conditioner in there for a few weeks in the summer.)

We also have a LOT of “other season” clothes. You know what I mean, we have basically whole wardrobes for summer and winter. We do a lot of layering up here when it starts getting cold. As a result, we have lots and lots of clothes.

I’m thinking of maybe asking the Graham to make two or three shelves to run along the back of this closet. That way, we could keep, the Winter clothes on there.

Maybe we could run the shelves around the corner, so that two-thirds of the closet would be in shelves. And it’s a nice deep closet, so there should be plenty of room. This should take care of all the clothes.

Then, if we leave the other side more open, maybe we could customize some shelves there to hold the purses, belts, scarves etc. with all the shoes and cowboy boots down below.